How to study medical illustration
If you want to study medical illustration, here is a good place to start to figure out your next steps.
If you have any questions or suggestions on how to improve this resource, do get in touch. Let’s help each other out.
What schools offer medical illustration?
There are a lot of schools that offer medical illustration around the world. The best thing to do is to familiarise yourself with all of the courses available and see if this is a path that you want to take.
What school should I apply to?
This is a tough decision so our question for you is: Job wise, what do you want to do after you finish a course? If you start at the end goal and work your way back then this will help you find a course to help you achieve that goal.
For example, if a person wants to be a 3D medical animator then they would need to find a course that has a curriculum that includes lots of animation and 3D modelling classes. But we understand that you might not have a clear idea of where you want to be at the end of your studies. That’s ok. You’ll still want to find a course that can set you up with enough skills to make you employable and there are a few tips we can share with you to help research and figure out which course is best for you.
1) WHAT KIND OF JOBS ARE OUT THERE?
Start at the end goal and see what kind of jobs are available for graduates. You can see a few job postings on our Learn Medical Art job board. Take a look at the job descriptions to see what kind of skills employers are looking for. You might see some trends as you research this as well as learn something new.
2) LOOK AT THEIR CURRICULUMS
Now that you know what employers are looking for, next take a closer look at the course curriculums. Your aim here is to look for classes that interest you as well as set you up with enough skills that make you employable. You can find all of the available courses for medical illustration on our education page.
3) CHECK OUT THE ALUMNI
It’s also useful to research whether the student alumni are working in the field and if they are in roles similar to your dream job. This might give a good indicator of how well the courses skill up their students. You can find alumni from the course websites. If you really want to get analytical about this you could do some research on your end on LinkedIn. Within LinkedIn you can search the course and school name to find a list of all of their alumni. Take a look at the job roles that these people are in now and their job titles will give you a good indicator on whether or not they are working in the industry or doing something completely different.
3) LOOK AT STUDENT & ALUMNI PORTFOLIOS
Check out the student and alumni portfolios and see if any of the work that they have created are similar to the type of work that you would like to achieve. This might be a good indicator of the types of classes they are offered.
4) TALK TO PAST STUDENTS
LinkedIn and other social media platforms are also great tools to connect with these alumni. Reach out to people that you admire and ask them how the schools prepared them for the job market. You might find that you get a lot of honest answers and insights about their experiences.
5) TALK TO THE SCHOOL
Another piece of information to obtain can be from the schools themselves. Sometimes the course leads will share information on the types of jobs and positions their alumni end up in. They can also share more detailed information about the course as well as hear about your experience and background.
6) INTERNSHIP OPPORTUNITIES
Internships are super valuable in helping you get career experience. Some schools have a lot of internship opportunities available though they might not be published on the course website. Reach out to the school to ask them what kind of internship opportunities are available, how many places there are and with what companies. Our Learn Medical Art hub does have an internship page, however, the schools would offer more as they have close connections with local organizations.
7) FOLLOW YOUR GUT
Lastly, we’d like to leave you with this tip: Follow what your gut says and do what feels right for you. No matter what choice you make, be sure to embrace every opportunity that is provided to you.
Making a decision to pursue a degree can be difficult, nevertheless there are tools and tips available for you to make an informed decision
At the end of the day, you need to do what’s best for you and your situation.
Is there a top medical illustration school?
There is no "best" medical illustration school. Every year the courses are constantly improving and evolving. Successful and unsuccessful people come out of all of the courses.
We’ve had many long conversations with friends from nearly all of the programs in both North America and the UK. Each program has it’s good and bad. Rather than dwell on that, the important thing is to utilize your time effectively at whichever school you choose.
All of the schools give you the very basics of what you need to know in order to continue learning on your own time and we want to stress learning on your own. Not only should you learn from your teachers but from all other fields in animation, design, illustration and interactivity. Keep up to date with current trends in each field and implement that into the stuff you’re going to be taught at school. Learn about animation pipelines and illustrative styles. Watch how other artists (outside of medical illustration and also in our field) create their work and, in turn, apply the same techniques to the stuff that you’ll be doing.
On top of all that you’re going to spend every waking moment researching about business and marketing yourself. Put those into practice and that is how you’re going to be able to stand out from the crowd.
When you come to applying for jobs, companies don’t care what school you go to. They want to see that you’re able to create beautiful artwork, have good design sense and be able to develop narratives that can contribute to their team. They can see this in your portfolio so make sure that you showcase your best work.
>> Check out our YouTube channel where we regularly post tutorials
>> Learn from other medical illustrators and animators in the field
What skills or qualities should a medical illustrator possess?
For us at the Learn Medical Art team, we all feel that the number one quality is always be learning. You must be willing to learn new techniques, software and even advancements in the field of science and medicine.
We get excited whenever new software features are announced. Most of us can be found watching YouTube tutorials for fun. You’ll probably find a lot of us watching surgical videos as we eat our lunch.
This is the stuff we geek out over and what excites us. Learning is what drives us and we’re constantly trying to improve ourselves and skillsets.
But that’s our personal opinion, we asked our Learn Medical Art audience and a few had some great insights:
“Creative problem solving! Whether you're a traditional artist, a coder, an animator, or all of the above, even just creative a powerful sciart concept requires creative thinking and decisive problem solving.”
— Sam Bond,
Clinical Assistant Professor,
University of Illinois at Chicago
“Desire to share. Medical illustration has the opportunity to inform people about their own bodies. The masses very often don’t have a clue about what is going on inside themselves. Medical illustrators might be best placed to fix this widespread unknowing.”
— Stuart Docherty
Stuart Docherty Studio
All of the schools list their course curriculums on their website. Check them out as this will give you an idea of the skills they teach and possibly the software they use.
Many of the grad programs offer introductory classes to industry-standard software:
Digital illustration in Adobe Photoshop
Vector illustration in Adobe Illustrator
3D animation in Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3DsMax or Cinema 4D
Post-production, visual effects and motion graphics in Adobe After Effects
Video and audio editing in Adobe Premiere pro
Graphic design with InDesign
E-learning development with a variety of programs like Articulate or something you build on your own
Coding (HTML, CSS, and possibly other stuff)
Virtual Reality with Unity and other programs
Business and marketing classes for the creative industry
Once you get the basics, it's up to you to research and learn on your own. The majority of us continue to learn and grow our skill sets throughout our careers. We do this by continuously reading articles online and watching hours of YouTube tutorials.
>> Check out the schools that teach medical illustration
If you’re ready to start your application, we have a few tips below to help keep things measured
How do I prepare for my application?
If you have a couple of schools that you’re interested in applying to, we have some suggestions on how to streamline your application process:
1) LOOK AT THE ENTRY REQUIREMENTS OF THE COURSES
Each school have very clear entry prerequisites listed on their websites. Make sure that you have everything checked off for your application.
If you’re an international student, make sure you also meet the international entry requirements as well, sometimes these are listed elsewhere on the school’s website.
2) TALK TO THE SCHOOLS
Do you have any questions or are uncertain about a particular aspect of the application process? Ask the school, they are the only people that can give you the correct answer.
It’s nice to know that all of the schools treat every applicant individually so don’t be afraid to reach out to see if they can provide advice for your individual situations.
3) TAKE ADVANTAGE OF PORTFOLIO REVIEWS
Did you know that some of the school’s offer portfolio reviews throughout the year? These are great opportunities to get your work reviewed and see if you need any improvements before you apply. Use this to your advantage and stay ahead of the game.
4) APPLY TO MORE THAN ONE PROGRAM
Entry into these courses are highly competitive and it’s best to have a couple of fallback options when you come to apply. Only do this if you are financially able to.
5) WORK SMARTER
Some of the programs have a similar application and portfolio requirements. Work smarter by writing everything down.
You could create a comparison chart, similar to this one that Alex Nazlidis made when he was applying for medical illustration grad school. By doing this, Alex could see any repeat information as well as have a good overview of what he needed to do for applications. A smart way of organisation!
6) CAN YOU TRANSFER TO A MEDICAL ILLUSTRATION COURSE?
It’s useful to know that there are many undergraduate medical illustration courses and you might not want to wait to apply for a graduate school course.
It might be an option for you to transfer to an undergraduate medical illustration course. Reach out to the admissions office and course coordinators of those programs to see what your eligibility is.
7) START PRACTICING AND BUILDING YOUR PORTFOLIO NOW
For nearly all of the schools, a comprehensive portfolio is required for the application. This part of your application you can start immediately.
Check out the portfolio requirements for each school and start practising these pieces as well as reading up on art fundamentals.
8) CHECK IN WITH YOUR PROGRESS AND ADJUST
Everything that we’ve listed so far is going to be a lot of research and hard work on your end to get things going.
Remember that this isn’t a one and done task! Make sure that you check in with your progress regularly, check the schools‘ websites and make any adjustments if things change.
This will keep you on top of your goals and you’ll be ready to pivot if things change.
>> See our tutorials on art fundamentals to help with your portfolios
Is it necessary to obtain a degree in medical illustration?
This is a hot topic of debate for many of us in the industry. Some people feel that not having a degree in medical illustration devalues the training of those that did obtain a degree. This is further reinforced by some unfortunate cases where people call themselves medical illustrators but have no experience in our industry’s best practices and produce content that is not up to industry standards.
On the other hand a few of us have worked with many medical illustrators and animators who did not go the 'traditional' route into the profession; a couple of those individuals became great leaders, art directors and production artists; bringing great value to the projects they did.
So what is our takeaway form our experiences?
1) The important thing we need to have is the science training; that’s our speciality and is part of the value we bring to our projects. If you find that you’re missing the science training then you can get this through schooling or learning on the job as part of your professional development. We’ve found that if you have a good attitude and talent, employers are willing to invest in your training to bring you up speed.
2) Secondly we need to have the creative training and be able to convey complex science into beautiful and engaging visuals. Understanding the fundamentals of art and design is key. Then there are visualization techniques that you can read about or learn through school.
3) Thirdly we need to keep up to date with industry best practices such as how we structure our files, how we use real MRI data to create visuals, what our production pipelines look like etc. This can be achieved by attending conferences and workshops, keeping an eye on what’s happening in social media and websites of industry leaders, following and connecting with other professionals in the field and regularly chatting with them.
So those are only opinions of a few people, let’s hear from our Learn Medical Art audience on this topic:
“An interesting topic, and for the most part I would agree. I think that training/Degree in the sciences does help vastly for scientific illustration, because knowledge and scientific understanding is important for accuracy. But I don't think a Degree or training is needed in every specific field of science illustrators (i.e. Degree training in biological illustration AND medical illustration). For example, I am doing a PhD in marine biology and tend to focus on biological illustration. I have been offered to do medical illustrations and am now looking into it. While I don't have a degree in the medical sciences, I am obtaining the highest scientific training available that allows me to network with scientists in other fields, and obtain resources/papers to get an understanding of how to illustrate that request accurately. I certainly hope that people wouldn't expect me to have a Masters on top of a PhD in two different fields when my work would speak for itself. I think the creative training is great for most, but not necessary for everyone (i.e. those with high skillsets). A lot of sci-artists I know are self-taught and beyond the fundamentals stage, but up to learning specific skills now (i.e. animation, 3D rendering etc.) I think the important part is how to accurately visualise data in conjunction with the illustration. This is something that a lot of illustrators and scientists struggle with to this day.”
“I believe the Masters degree combined with the education from a medical school holds a lot of weight in the public eye, keeping the medical illustration industry professional and highly paid, especially moving into the future as medicine and science and software technology develop. We can get in trouble if we call ourselves artists and settle for art design salaries. Be proud, our profession is unique and necessary in the world.”
— agcmi
You got this!
Whatever school you apply for, you know you will have done your best in building your application. Good luck!
Frequently Asked Questions
I am close to finishing school, do you think any credits of any classes would/could be transferred?
If you are interested in applying to a medical illustration program and you have this question, your best steps are to reach out to the course leads or the admissions team of the program. Each person has unique and different transcripts and they can provide a personalized response in regards to your educational background.
Is it possible for foreign graduates to get into the programs?
Yes, it’s totally possible for international students to enter the programs. Do know that there are additional entry requirements for international students applying to the graduate programs and this information can be found on the course website as well as the graduate school site.
If you have any inquiries you can either direct them to the admissions office of the course you’re interested in or you can reach out to the international student services department of the University.
When it comes to student visas make sure you look at the official government website for the most up to date information and you can use other forums and sites to supplement that information to keep yourself informed.
Our resources for you
Medical illustration schools
We’ve sourced and listed a whole bunch of undergraduate and graduate programs that offer medical or scientific illustration.
Medical illustration jobs
It’s always useful to see what kind of jobs are available out there for a medical illustrator or animator. Knowing what skills employers look for might help you determine which courses and classes you should take.
How to finance your education
There are some options on how to finance your education. We’ve listed some tips here on how you can explore further.
External resources
Below are some external resources that we’ve listed above and have collated them all here for you. Happy researching!